Celtics don't expect immediate help from draft

BOSTON — The Boston Celtics head into tonight's draft with low expectations of getting players who will help next season. A year ago, they needed all the help they could get.

HOWARD ULMAN

BOSTON — The Boston Celtics head into tonight's draft with low expectations of getting players who will help next season. A year ago, they needed all the help they could get.

Going from the NBA's second-worst record to the league championship changes what general manager Danny Ainge thinks he'll get from the draft. Still, he works past midnight trying to make the best team better.

"We were up 'til 2 in the morning last night," Ainge said Wednesday. "We're still doing the same amount of work. We still feel under the gun to make the right decision even though it's not as huge a franchise changing and altering decision."

He's already made that.

A year ago, he obtained Ray Allen from Seattle in a draft-night trade that sent the fifth pick, Georgetown's Jeff Green, to Seattle. The addition of the star shooting guard paved the way for the trade that brought Kevin Garnett from Minnesota about a month later.

Less than 11 months after Garnett arrived, those two and finals MVP Paul Pierce led the Celtics to their 17th NBA title, clinching the championship in six games on June 17 against the Los Angeles Lakers.

So there's not much room for the players the Celtics draft — the 30th and 60th overall if they keep their picks — to contribute next season.

"We hope that we can, but the odds would say that we don't," Ainge said. "You're talking about a lineup of a team that's vying for a championship."

And it's a "real longshot" that he would trade to get a better pick.

Besides, Ainge thinks Gabe Pruitt, who played sparingly after being drafted with the 32nd pick last year, can contribute next season. He thinks the former Southern California guard would have been a first-round draft pick tonight had he stayed in school for a fourth year.

"He will be a player that were counting on to do some things next year," Ainge said.

The Celtics also have Glen "Big Baby" Davis, who came in the trade for Allen after being drafted by Seattle and had some solid stretches in the regular season but played in only one game in the finals, a 15-minute stint.

Tonight's picks almost certainly will wait longer, perhaps even playing overseas for a few years to develop their games.

"There's a few players we wouldn't draft unless they were willing to do that first," Ainge said.

James Posey and Eddie House can become free agents. P.J. Brown is leaning toward retirement, Ainge said. And Sam Cassell could retire as well. If any of them leave, openings would emerge that a draft pick might fill.

"We hope to sign a couple of" the potential free agents, Ainge said. "A lot of times when you have a championship one season, a lot of players want to take advantage of that and really catapult their career and go on to maybe bigger roles and a bigger paycheck, so we'll see."

He expects Posey to draw several contract offers after a season in which he emerged as a valuable sixth man who could play lockdown defense and drain 3-pointers.

By Wednesday, the Celtics had worked out about 50 potential draftees, similar to last year's number, and Ainge had reduced to 23 the number of players he was considering with the first pick.

He went into last year's draft with a much shorter list after the Celtics got the fifth pick — disappointing after they finished with the second-worst record — in the draft lottery.

"I wouldn't say that it wasn't fun last year with all the pressure and intensity and all the different things we had going on with the top pick, and a little bit under fire," Ainge said. "I think that this is equally as fun and we also have less options.

"We have really high contracts, we have lower contracts and we don't have a lot of in between," he said. "And we don't have as many tradable options."

One thing he does have is a championship. One thing he doesn't have is a need to start transforming his team on draft night.

"It's a simpler process this year," Ainge said.

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